


Stop Motion

by lifeinwords



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-14
Updated: 2011-06-14
Packaged: 2017-10-20 09:54:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/211500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifeinwords/pseuds/lifeinwords
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What war doesn't erase, the survivors do. Also, there is a satin ribbon. (Written post-OOtP)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stop Motion

Colin’s darkroom is papered with funeral pictures: black robes, grey faces, and the white blossoms for those fallen in battle. He doesn’t have regular lights up anyway, and when he’s working, he barely sees them.

The white ribbon looks crisp and professional around the black portrait case. The arrangement had taken a good bit of thought, and he carefully places it in his satchel before dashing out of the apartment.

The last train is just pulling into Platform 9¾ when Colin runs through the pillar, and only a few others are waiting for it. The new train is sleek and modern; Colin misses the smoke plumes, the creaky doors. It’s nice to have a car all to himself, even if the unmarked seats just remind him of their car—always the third down, Dennis across from him, the twins at his right.

Colin sneaks a hand into his satchel and strokes the satiny ribbon.

**

Colin didn’t care for Muggle Studies all that much—he was, after all, Muggle-born himself—but he hadn’t the head for Arithmancy or Divination. The best project had been fourth year: a month-long exercise in using something Muggle and a project diary; the easiest bit of homework he’d ever done.

They couldn’t get anything with electricity to work, but there were plenty of props to choose from. Colin had eyed the mechanical pencil, but then he’d seen the camera. It wasn’t like the little point-and-shoot he used to take pictures for his parents and Dennis. It was complicated, and old-fashioned; if people didn’t stay perfectly still for more than a moment, the shot wouldn’t come out.

First he tried posing people, but no one would stay still. His first roll was blurry, but he kept shooting, looking for things he could tell with a single shot. Flash: Hermione whispering angrily at Harry in the library. Flash: Ginny watching Dean walk down the hall with Lavender. Flash: Fred-or-George winking at George-or-Fred.

For weeks, all he thought was stop bath, shutter speed, F stop, telephoto, and all he smelled was the ammonia on his hands.

**

Colin jumps when the train-lamps flare on, and a glance at his watch shows he’ll just make the dinner if he changes now. A House Elf takes his bag as he steps down from the carriage, and reaches for the heavy strap around his neck.

Outside the Great Hall he pauses to smooth his hair and tuck away the trailing ends of the ribbon. He enters on the standing ovation and immediately glances toward the Head Table. Finnegan and Granger are the only visible faces in the crush.

The second course has appeared by the time Colin pushes through to the far corner. It’s empty but for a few heroes. Flash: Shacklebolt rubbing the stump below his knee. Flash: that Jones girl feeding Longbottom potatoes, wiping his blank face. Flash: Fred Weasley drinking steadily, each swallow stretching the thick black scar down his left cheek.

Colin wonders how much of the privacy is due to respect.

Words are useless anyway, so it doesn’t matter that Colin can’t think of any. He stops right in front of Fred and slides the portfolio across the scarred tabletop, carefully navigating circles of condensation, not returning Fred’s stare.

**

When he asked the twins to be his subject they ruffled his hair and made him promise not to show any incriminating photos around. It was hard to find still moments with Fred and George; they were always mugging and making things explode.

Flash: Fred diving away from a Bludger. Flash: George laughing so hard he almost fell off his broom. Flash: heads bent together over the equipment trunk.

When he started developing final prints, every shot was mid-action, and Colin knew he didn’t have anything that regular eyes couldn’t see.

He’d loaded a fresh roll of film, paused before the Seventh Year dorm to check the light levels. Colin had eased the door open slowly and angled the lens toward Fred’s bed on the far right. It was six shots before he realized what he was seeing: sleeping twins, legs tangled, freckled skin standing out against the crumpled white of the sheets. Their faces were turned in toward each other like a mirror, their hips aligned and arms flung wide. Colin didn’t breathe until he’d finished the roll, the same shot over and over: twins, still.

He’d kept those for himself.

**

The room’s suddenly too quiet. Colin shouldn’t be able to hear the quick flip-flip of Fred’s fingers through his photos, but he can, and he tries not to be impatient

He glances up, just to check, and Fred’s face has gone white, freckles like pinpricks of blood. His fingers slip as he stacks the pictures, and Colin winces at the idea of fingerprints. Fred shuffles picture after picture into a thick pile, letting a few others fall around his feet. He pauses at the last one before putting it on top.

Colin knows the last photo well: skin, sunlight, matching curves of hip and spine and smile. Fred stares through it, and his chair scrapes on the stone as he stands. Colin winces at the sound. Fred’s wand is in his hand, and Colin sees him mouth the spell, but it registers too late. Incendio.

Smoke puffs up from the table, and Fred stumbles out of a side-door. Colin bends down and carefully gathers the remaining photos. He repairs the impression of a boot from George’s laughing face, and cards through the rest so fast he feels dizzy.

Flash: George chewing a quill while studying. Flash: George tickling Ron. Flash: George with a six-foot tongue. They’re accidents, almost: one twin alone.

Twenty photos left, and the white ribbon is only a bit singed, so Colin wraps them up and searches through the crowd for another spot of red.

Maybe Mrs. Weasley would want them. They’d already been paid for, thanks to the Minister’s Honorable Death Measure, and Colin would hate for his work to go to waste.


End file.
